The present disclosure relates to gap fillers and footboard pads for beds used in hospitals and other patient care facilities such as nursing homes. More particularly, the present disclosure relates to gap fillers and footboard pads that are attachable to bed frames in different orientations.
Many beds used in hospitals have siderails, footboards, and headboards which server as barriers to prevent a patient from easily exiting the bed. The siderails are typically movable between respective raised positions, in which patient egress is blocked, and lowered positions, in which patient egress is permitted. It is sometimes desirable to add additional barriers in the spaces or gaps that may exist between the siderails of a bed and the associated headboard or footboard. These additional barriers are sometimes referred to as gap fillers.
During the care of some patients, it may be desirable to have the bottoms of the patient's feet supported against a generally vertical pad provided adjacent the footboard of the associated bed. Some hospital beds, such as the TotalCare bed and the VersaCare bed available from Hill-Rom Company, Inc., have extendable and retractable foot sections that can be adjusted in length. The length adjustment is accomplished by one or more actuators that are controlled by control circuitry of the bed in response to commands entered on user inputs of the bed. Thus, in such beds, the foot section can be retracted from its most extended position to move the footboard toward the patient's feet and then, eventually, into contact with the bottoms of the patient's feet for patients having a wide variety of heights. It is not uncommon to place a pad between the patient's feet and the footboard in these instances.